Z

Velvet Saint didn’t look like the kind of place where women disappeared.

That was probably the point.

The building occupied the ground floor of an old bank downtown, with red velvet ropes outside and brass doors polished so perfectly they reflected the streetlights.

Rich men came there to feel dangerous.

Dangerous men came there to feel untouchable.

Declan came through the front entrance like the building belonged to him.

Maybe for that night, it did.

I walked beside him.

Ronan followed with two men whose names I didn’t know.

“You stay beside me,” Declan said.

“You’ve said that four times.”

“I’ll say it five.”

“I’m not twelve.”

“No twelve-year-old has ever argued with me this much.”

“That probably says more about you.”

His mouth almost twitched.

Almost.

Inside, music rolled through the room like a heartbeat.

Women in black dresses carried champagne.

Men sat in private booths behind smoked glass.

A bartender recognized Declan and went pale.

Good.

I was learning to appreciate that reaction.

The manager appeared less than two minutes later.

His name was Elliot Crane.

Forty.

Expensive watch.

Expensive smile.

Dead eyes.

“Mr. Walsh.”

“Elliot.”

“What brings you here?”

Declan glanced around.

“Curiosity.”

Elliot’s smile tightened.

“About?”

“Mason Rourke.”

The music suddenly seemed too loud.

Elliot laughed.

“I’m afraid Mr. Rourke isn’t here.”

“I didn’t ask where he was.”

Declan stepped closer.

“I asked you once, eight months ago, whether Rourke was using this club to collect private debts.”

Elliot’s face changed.

“I said no.”

“You lied.”

I saw the moment Elliot noticed me.

Recognition flashed in his eyes.

There.

Declan saw it too.

“You know her,” he said.

Elliot recovered.

“I know many women.”

Declan moved so fast I barely saw it.

One moment his hand was at his side.

The next, Elliot was pinned against the wall.

No shouting.

No dramatic display.

Just controlled violence.

“Wrong answer.”

“Declan.”

My voice stopped him.

His grip loosened.

Not because Elliot deserved mercy.

Because I asked.

Elliot straightened his jacket.

“You’re making a mistake.”

“No,” Declan said. “I’m correcting one.”

Ronan walked behind the bar and disappeared through a service hallway.

Two minutes later he returned.

“There’s a locked corridor.”

Elliot’s face drained.

Declan looked at him.

“Open it.”

“It’s storage.”

“Then you won’t mind.”

Nobody moved.

Declan sighed.

“Ronan.”

The door was open thirty seconds later.

I followed them down a narrow hallway.

At the end stood a red door.

The lock was electronic.

Ronan entered a code taken from Elliot’s phone.

The light turned green.

Inside were no women.

Thank God.

There were files.

Hundreds of them.

Metal cabinets lined the walls.

Names had been written on folders.

Amounts.

Addresses.

Photographs.

I stepped closer.

One folder caught my attention.

MERCER, SOPHIE.

My hands began trembling.

Declan saw it.

“Lena.”

“I need to see.”

“You don’t have to.”

“Yes.”

I opened the file.

Sophie’s photograph was clipped to the inside cover.

She was smiling.

It had been taken before the illness became visible.

Before her hair fell out.

Before hospitals made her skin pale.

My knees nearly gave out.

Declan’s hand hovered at my back but didn’t touch me until I leaned toward him.

Only then did he steady me.

There were payment schedules.

Hospital records.

Copies of my work history.

My apartment lease.

Pictures of me leaving Ellis Diner.

Pictures of me entering Declan’s mansion.

“They were watching me.”

“Yes.”

Ronan was searching another cabinet.

“Declan.”

Something in his voice made us both turn.

He held a ledger.

“You need to see this.”

Declan read one page.

Then another.

His face became unreadable.

“What?”

He handed it to me.

I didn’t understand the numbers at first.

Then I noticed the categories.

ACTIVE DEBT.

TRANSFER.

PLACEMENT.

PRIVATE SERVICE.

The names of women appeared beside dollar amounts.

Some had been crossed out.

“What does placement mean?”

Nobody answered.

I already knew.

My stomach turned.

Sophie’s name appeared near the bottom of one page.

Next to it:

DECEASED.

TRANSFER: L. MERCER.

PROJECTED COLLECTION VALUE: $240,000.

I stared at the number.

“I was never supposed to finish paying.”

Declan looked at me.

“No.”

The truth hit me in waves.

There was no end.

No final payment.

No day when Mason Rourke would shake my hand and say we were even.

He had planned to bleed me until I collapsed.

Then, when I couldn’t pay anymore, I would become something else he could sell.

I sat on the floor.

Declan crouched in front of me.

“Look at me.”

I couldn’t.

“Lena.”

“I’m so stupid.”

His expression changed instantly.

“No.”

“I paid him sixty-eight thousand dollars.”

“You were threatened.”

“I believed him.”

“You were grieving.”

“I should have checked.”

“You were twenty-four years old burying your sister.”

His voice hardened.

“He chose that moment because he knew you wouldn’t think clearly.”

I finally looked at him.

“That doesn’t make me less stupid.”

“No.”

He leaned closer.

“It makes him a predator.”

Something inside me cracked.

Not dramatically.

No screaming.

No sobbing.

Just one tear sliding down my face.

Then another.

Declan lifted his hand.

He stopped before touching me.

Waiting.

I nodded.

His thumb brushed the tear away.

The gesture was so gentle it nearly broke me completely.

Ronan’s voice came from behind us.

“We have another problem.”

Declan stood.

“What?”

Ronan held a second ledger.

“Payments from Velvet Saint were being routed through six shell companies.”

“So?”

“One belongs to us.”

The room went silent.

Declan took the ledger.

His face hardened.

“Who controls it?”

Ronan looked like he hated the answer.

“Patrick Crane.”

I knew that name.

Everybody who worked inside Declan’s house did.

Patrick Crane was Declan Walsh’s accountant.

His adviser.

His father’s oldest friend.

A man who had eaten dinner at Declan’s table every Sunday for fifteen years.

I whispered, “Someone inside your organization is helping Rourke.”

Declan stared at the page.

“Yes.”

That was when we heard the first gunshot upstairs.

The lights went out a second later.

Declan grabbed me and pulled me against him.

“Stay down.”

Another shot.

Glass breaking.

Men shouting.

Ronan drew his weapon.

Declan pushed me behind a steel filing cabinet.

“Do not move.”

My breathing accelerated.

“What about you?”

His eyes locked with mine in the dark.

“I’m going upstairs.”

“Declan—”

He caught my face between both hands.

For one second, the most feared man in Grayhaven looked less like a crime boss and more like a man terrified of leaving someone behind.

“I’m coming back.”

“You can’t promise that.”

“No.”

His thumb brushed my cheek.

“But I can make sure every man upstairs understands how badly I want to.”

Then he was gone.

I sat in darkness beside my dead sister’s file while gunshots echoed above me.

And for the first time, I understood the difference between fearing Declan Walsh...

and being afraid for him.